eyes and bones and all

three days post-op
there are five left
on Alone UK

the one who dances in the forest
gets lost in trees
who curses at birds

the one who boils underwear in a pot
so bears won’t come
for the smell of blood

the one who weeps for a squirrel
who takes its tooth
to carve a coal tattoo

the one without fish
who starves laughing
from a bed of sticks

the one who traps a mouse
who sears, skewers, sucks
eyes and bones and all

this forest this blood
this tooth and coal
this bed of sticks

this grey mouse caught
between slabs of schist
these eyes and bones this all

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Rebecca Ball is a poetry and fiction writer from Ōtautahi Christchurch, Aotearoa New Zealand. She has other new poems and stories out this year in Landfall, Flash Frontier, The Quick Brown Dog and Shot Glass Journal.